After having discussed the true nature of the philosopher Socrates now turns to their absolute concern: the study of the Good. To be sure though, upon being questioned Socrates admits that he cannot tell his comrades exactly what the Good is. In light of this inablity though he says that he can at least attempt to discuss an offspring of the good.
So for this blog, tell me what he offers as a likeness of the Good. Be sure to explain how it works and how this offspring helps us understand the Good itself. Futhermore, for those adventurous sorts give me your own analogy of the good. What do you think it is in itself or is like?
Cheers and Happy Halloween,
Dr. Layne
lato defines the good as the "offspring of the good." He talks about the good as being to the intelligible world what the sun is to the visible world. The sun makes things visible and the Good makes things intelligible and makes knowledge possible. Plato states that knowledge and truth are "goodlike" but that neither of them in themselves are the Good. He goes on to extend the analogy of the sun, indicating that the sun allows things to come into being and to grow. Similarly, "objects of knowledge owe their being known to the Good."
ReplyDeleteI think this analogy helps us to understand that the Good is sort of a large external source like the sun that allows other things to grow and have meaning. The Good is a source of meaning for all knowledge and truth...this is a difficult concept to understand, made clearer by Plato's sun analogy.
Plato offers intelligibility or basic truth as a likeness of the Good, for the more one knows (realizes the truth) than the more good he can create or spread throughout society. The offspring helps us understand the Good itself because it emphasizes its importance to people, not only to live a good life but i think he also alludes to the Good being an important element for a society to prosper.
ReplyDeleteSocrates said that the ability to see the effects of the Good is the offspring of the Good, for what is the Good worth unless you can see the effects of it? He explains that the offspring, the ability to see the effects of the Good, works as such, in the form of this analogy: for seeing to work, there must be sight, the physical ability to perceive; the object of perception; and the light which allows perception through intelligibility of the object to be perceived. Without light, the eyes could not perceive the object. In relation to the Good, we have the ability of learning, the objects and ideas of which to learn, and the Good, which allows for learning and knowledge of the world, and is also the source of knowledge.
ReplyDeleteI think Socrates is going somewhere with these analogies. The sun, he uses as an example, gives us light, it changes seasons and helps things grow thus it produces a good (making it, its offspring). We can later go into how light gives us sight, which gives us knowledge, which makes us intelligent and so on and so forth.
ReplyDeleteSocrates said that the ideal life was one which was spent searching for the good...I think this is true, in the sense that, no one really knows what good is. It is not definable, like the word "desk" or an object, like an automobile. Its an intangible perspective, so if one uses his life, doing what he believes is worth or "good", I think he can find his own good. This can run into problems when you have the whole "one mans terrorist, another mans freedom fighter" kind of Catch 22, but I think the point remains the same, and in this same, Socrates was definitely on to something.
ReplyDeleteSocraes, when ever he talks about the study of the good, seems to talk a lot about the nature of the good. He seems to refer to the good as knowing the natural needs for the self. This knowledge leds one to knowing the true good and not the opposite. The analogy I can think of for this is that one who knows the true good knows that killing is bad but, one who thinks its good does not know or has not learned natural good.
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